Houellebecq's Atomised is a hard act to follow. A ludicrously ambitious novel about the failings of contemporary society which compelled and shocked at the same time, the book received ample coverage, high sales for a work of literary fiction and won the lucrative Impac award. Platform shares much in common with its predecessor but, if anything, the work is more uncompromising. Michel, an administrator in a Paris art gallery, takes a holiday in Thailand following his father's murder. What follows is a travelogue with a difference, casting a cold eye on the narrator as well as his fellow package holiday tourists, and taking in Emmanuel Kant, economic theory, Agatha Christie, sexual politics and even a socially-conscious pornographic film entitled Senior Citizens on the Rampage.